Carving the JackOLantern
by FrankandJoe3
Summary: No matter how hard he tried to hide, Wally always knew what he was hiding. Slight KF/Rob


******Note, this is not written about _me_. This is written for my dearest Abby Mae. Honey, if you keep this up, he really will end up killing you, even if it is on accident. GET THE F-CK OVER HIM! It's been three months damnit! It's your fault anyway! _YOU _broke it off with _HIM! _Just accept it and move on. You wanted Daniel. You made your choice. LIVE WITH IT. *grumble mumble***

It looked like Dick had taken a nail file to his knuckles in Wally's opinion. The skin under each delicate bone was cut open into huge circle-like shapes, blood often still falling from the wound, the skin outside of it a dark red that stood out like a flamingo in a Dalmatian pack. That wasn't it though. The sides of his hands and his actual fingers were dark blue and purple, heavy bruised. It must've hurt something awful because every time the ebony moved his fingers, he'd wince or bite sharply down into his abused bottom lip.

At first Wally had simply brushed it off as training accidents. That idea was soon discarded when Wally noticed that Dick would roll his sleeves down further over his hands whenever Batman neared. In the practice fights, Dick would always have his gloves on, even if he was in civvies, same with simple weight lifting, but only if Batman was around. It was obvious that wearing his gloves made it worse because with every movement, a silent whimper would escape his lips, noticed only by Superboy and Wally, but one had super hearing so that shouldn't count.

Wally admitted that he probably jumped to the idea of self-abuse too fast, but he cared for Dick, so he couldn't necessarily help. He had to know what was hurting his little bird, no matter the cost. So, being Wally, he just asked as soon as he could. Soon turned out to be that next morning.

Dick and Wally were sitting on the couch together like usual, their thighs touching and their feet propped up on the coffee table, listening to Wally's MP3 Player. They had the volume up all the way, their ear phones in the ears that weren't facing the person beside them just in case they wanted to talk, they could hear each other. It was Dick's turn to pick a song. He reached over and gingerly plucked the music player from the ginger's hands, smiling at how warm Wally's hands were compared to his.

Wally looked down and noticed his pain riddled hands, the smile on his own lips fading to a light look of disapprovement. Dick didn't notice though. He was busy switching to a song he liked: Dead by My Chemical Romance. True, he wasn't much for music like that, but he was in a dark mood like he had been in all week and he craved nothing more than music like that to fuel his flames. Wally stayed silent and stared at Dick's hands, a mix of anger and sorrow carved into his face like the faces on Mt. Rushmore. He kept staring for a long while, slowly losing his grip on reality.

"If your life won't wait and your heart can't take this! _Have _you heard the news that you're _dead_? No one ever had much nice to say; I don't think they ever liked you anyway… You're dead!" Dick sang along under his breath.

He stopped when he noticed Wally was staring. He raised an eyebrow, pushing his shades weakly up higher on his nose. Thinking Wally just wanted to hold hands, Dick set one hand down on the couch beside his, keeping his eyes on the MP3 player. The ginger, with a frown, carefully grabbed Dick's hand in his own, raising it into the air by his eyes. He was careful not to touch any of the bruised area with the four fingers he had curled around the back of Dick's hand. The ebony looked at him from the screen on the music player, trying to hide a look of fear. He just _knew _that Wally was going to freak out on him for this.

"What happened to your hands?" Wally asked it loud enough to be heard above the music, but soft enough to avoid the ears of anyone nearby who would've cared enough to listen.

Dick didn't answer. He rested the hand with Wally's MP3 Player on his other side so Wally couldn't grab it. The redhead reached over anyway, prying his possession from the bruised fingers and setting it down before taking the only free hand of Dick's in his own. He held both hands carefully, studying them with a broken heart. He didn't want to yell, he didn't want to scream, he didn't want to fight. He just wanted his boy to be okay.

"Please Rob…" Wally wasn't bothered by how broken his voice was. He raised his eyes and stared into Dick's dark blue beauties. "What happened…? Did you… Did _you… _You hurt yourself?"

Dick averted his stare, looking down at their joined hands. Something was off. Wally had jokingly held hands with him before, usually to either prove a point or just because he was cold, or when he didn't want Dick running off. This time though, he felt like it meant something. When he didn't answer again, Wally tightened his hold, lowering their hands so if Batman was to walk through, Wally wouldn't get forced through a meat grinder.

"Just… tell me the truth…" Dick wouldn't meet his gaze.

Wally's eyebrows furrowed and a knot began to form in his throat. Dick wasn't going to tell him, but he had to know. This was _his _ebony. He was going to find out why any breath the boy took wasn't a good one.

"Richard John Grayson of Gotham City," he growled under his breath, catching Dick's surprised and fearful eyes finally, "what happened to your hands?"

Dick couldn't feel his heart anymore, but he didn't want to feel it. There probably wasn't a bare patch of it showing anymore. Every spot of it was either sewn or covered in Band-Aids. He felt that he had to tell Wally though. He owed the ginger so much that it was nowhere even close to the same playing fields where it might've been considered even mildly funny.

"I…" Dick's eyes widened at how bad his voice shook, so he coughed it off, "… I punched a wall… several times… hundreds of times… thousands of times…"

Wally's eyes widened and he tensed.

"W-W… Why?" he struggled to stay calm and cool when all he truly wanted to do was grab Dick by the shoulders and shake him back and forth until the insanity was shaken from his brain.

The ebony adjusted his hands so Wally was holding them in a more comfortable way now. He bowed his head to avoid the judgmental emerald eyes.

"Because I promised you I wouldn't cut…" Dick whispered, his eyes unconsciously darting to his hidden but marred stomach.

Besides a sexy six pack, there were enough deep scars there to look like a hyped up pack of three year olds had gone crazy on him with red sharpies. Inside of Wally's chest, the wrong kind of fireworks went off and his heart ultimately exploded. The explosion bounced all around until it reached his brain, triggering a muscle he didn't know he had. He released Dick's hands in one fluid motion before tightly wrapping his arms around the boy beside him.

"_Wouldn't it be grand if we- were- dead?_" My Chemical Romance still played through their ear phones, but they weren't listening.

Wally rested his head beside Dick's, tightening his hold so the ebony wouldn't be able to back away.

"Stop."

Dick swallowed hard. Wally sounded really mad.

"But W-…" he took a deep breath. "Fine."

Wally grabbed Dick by the shoulders roughly, pushing him back enough so they were staring in each other's eyes.

"Promise me. No more hurting yourself. I'm not losing you over-… Actually, I'm not losing you at all…" his voice trailed and he let go as an idea seemed to spark through his mind.

He sat up and reached into his pocket, rummaging for a moment. Dick was blushing madly, smiling ghostly to himself, letting his hair hang down in his now exposed dark blue eyes. Dick was too busy blushing to notice Wally pull a red sharpie from his pocket. He didn't notice Wally uncap it either.

"_I'm not losing you…" _Wally's words kept echoing through Dick's mind, drowning out the rest of the world.

He was snapped from his mind though when Wally suddenly turned back to him and lifted his shirt. Dick let out a squeal of protest, trying to pull his shirt back down.

"Oh hush, let me count. You know this secretly turns you on," Wally smirked, circling every individual scar and silently moving his lips and counting.

Dick couldn't help but giggle as the sharpie and Wally's warm hand brushed his exposed stomach, but he winced as the marker moved over the edges of old scars. He squirmed, giggling and wincing every second or so. Wally made sure to take his sweet time, blushing behind his smirk until he had circled the last scar. Then, right on Dick's heart, Wally wrote 35 in large print, drawing a heart around it and putting a line through the middle of it. Then he pulled Dick's shirt down, picking up one hand in his own, pulling the sleeves back. He turned Dick's hand over, being as careful as he could. He started to count the scars there when he froze, his eyes accusingly glancing up at Dick.

"Why did you carve my name on your arm?" he asked cautiously, running a thumb unconsciously over a crude 'WALLY' that actually looked pretty new.

Dick grumbled under his breath, blushing badly. He adjusted his shirt, regretting that one awkward night that he had gotten a hold of the pumpkin carver. He muttered something about 'never having' and 'hopeless dreaming', so Wally let it go for the moment. He took back to counting on that hand before writing 21 in a square and drawing a diagonal line through it. He did the same on the other wrist, writing 15 in a triangle, but his eyes kept darting back to the wrist with his name written on it.

"Bro…" Wally shook his head in disapprovement, adding in his head.

Then, he wrote 71 on Dick's forehead in sharpie. The ebony let out a cry of surprise, trying to turn away. It was too late though.

"Wally! Batman's gonna kill me!" Dick squeaked, crossing his eyes as he tried to look at his forehead.

Wally just smirked though, pocketing his sharpie.

"I'm going to check every day. If this number ever changes," he gently pressed his lips to the number on his best friend's forehead, "I'll just have to carve myself up too, only twice as much as you did."

Dick's eyes swelled, but he wasn't sure if it was over the kiss or the threat. He frantically pulled his jacket sleeves down over his hands, just in case. Wally pulled back, feeling confident.

"You can't hide from me forever Grayson," Wally teased, picking up his MP3 Player before walking out of the room.

Dick sat there on the couch, tingling all over. Then, he smiled widely to himself, looking down at his hands. The scars suddenly meant nothing to him, but he still felt the need to hide them, same with himself.

**Dedicated to Abby Mae Caitlyn. Girl, I know you'll never have Noah back, but that's no reason to butcher yourself. I hope this was okay. I'm rather doubtful. **

**-F.J. **


End file.
